


Non-Negotiable

by ReachForTheStars



Category: Fallout (Video Games), Fallout: New Vegas
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-06-20
Updated: 2018-06-20
Packaged: 2019-05-26 02:54:59
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,361
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14991224
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ReachForTheStars/pseuds/ReachForTheStars
Summary: Courier Six has a plan to get the best of both worlds.





	Non-Negotiable

Brian Wellington slowly let out a long breath as the elevator doors slid open. He removed his cowboy hat, pleasantly surprised at the lack of sunburn on his neck. Even with autumn advancing toward winter, the Mojave days were too hot for helmets, and too sunny for his pale skin that never seemed to tan properly. But the desperado hat was perfect.

The boots of his heavy combat armor thudded, despite the carpet. Its composite plates were dented by bullets and scorched by lasers, but still served their purpose. He propped his laser rifle against the wall, and sighed again. It would be hours, now, before he could get around to what needed to be done to keep it working.

Behind him, a buzzing, magnetically levitated, nuclear-powered metal orb (known to its friends as ED-E, and its enemies as "what the fuck is that thing - oh, shit, it's shooting lasers at us!") exited the elevator, followed in turn by a ghoul with a giant pistol in a loose hip holster.

"Raul, help me sort these things, please," Brian said, dropping a full pack on the floor. Pulling more items from his pockets, he headed into the main bedroom. 

"Sure thing, boss. Should I fetch you an iced Nuka-Cola, as well?"

Brian rolled his eyes. Useful combat equipment went in the footlocker by the bed: a modded 10mm pistol, a combat knife, and so on...there was less of this than usual, as he'd just returned from Gomorrah. Things to be sold, to the Followers or the Gun Runners, went in the locker by the wall: already overflowing with decrepit or actually broken weapons, ragged and filthy clothes, and tanks of fuel. He set those things atop the pile; he'd take them down to the fort later. And things to keep: souvenirs, or things that were just interesting, went in all sorts of places: in the desk, atop the desk, on the shelves, propped against the walls...but mostly in the wardrobes to the right of the bed. The guns from the recently deceased Omerta bosses fell into this category, as did their pre-War suits. There was much less stuff than usual. He hadn't even had to gulp beer or pop Buffout to be able to carry everything back here, the way he usually did. Fortunate: both tasted awful. He dusted his hands, but flecks of dried blood clung. He sighed. Why did the world have to be like this? Because some intelligent fools had built nukes, and others had built rockets, and the last bunch had fired them off, that was why. Raul ambled off into the kitchen as Brian scrubbed his hands under the sink's stream of sterile, cold water. The stain lingered. He twisted the faucet shut a little harder than necessary, and strode for the living room - then paused, went on more slowly, considering what to say. 

"Well, now, look what rolled in," Cass drawled, lowering her cue. Veronica looked up, reflexively smoothing her green dress, which drew Brian's gaze to a missing button. Five empty whiskey bottles stood on the rim of the pool table. 

"You drink all that?" Brian asked, pointing as he made his way around. 

"Well, three of 'em yesterday, two tuh-day," Cass answered.

"The rest of the ones from yesterday are in the kitchen," Veronica chimed in. "You know, maybe the Broth - we - should start collecting pre-War whiskey as well, protect Cass from it." 

"That's my job," Cass retorted. "I drink all the potentsurely danger-ous whiskey to get it away from folks what can't drink it respawnshibly. Respuniblly." She pulled a third, almost empty bottle from the shelf in the pool table and drained it. 

"You are a veritable paragon of altruism, Miss Cassidy," Arcade said dryly. He stood up from the chair, marking his place in his book. "What's up?" he asked Brian. 

"You know, I've been meaning to catch up with my new friends in Freeside," he said as casually as he could manage. "I reckon you folks should come." 

"Why?" Veronica asked.  


"Well, do you have anything more productive to do? I thought you hated this place anyway, Cass, Arcade - let's do something interesting."  


"Aw, I was winnin'," Cass said, but tossed her cue aside. "Lemme just get my shotgun..." She bumped into the doorway going through it. Brian glanced at Arcade and raised his eyebrows.  


"Shotguns are clearly the best tactical choice for Cass, in that accuracy, and hence sobriety, are somewhat optional," Arcade opined.

********************************

Cass seemed to sober up a bit on route, mainly because Brian had slipped the whiskey out of her pack before they left. Veronica and Arcade conversed about the faded pre-War signs along the street; Brian heard him say "look on my consumer goods, ye mighty, and despair." Raul scanned for trouble, hand never far from his holster, despite ED-E buzzing along over their heads. Fortunately, they reached the Atomic Wrangler without incident. Boone met them there; he'd had some business in Freeside that morning that he'd refused, with his usual atonal monosyllables, to explain.  


"What precisely are we doing in this den of iniquity?" Arcade asked as they approached.  


"We're going upstairs. The Garretts gave me a room here for some work I did for 'em."  


The Garretts were dealing with customers at the bar, but Brian waved cheerfully as the group went by. A few scruffy-looking people sat by the bar, drinking cheap beer. A cheer rose from by the blackjack table as someone won money that would, no doubt, be quickly lost again.  


"Well, look who's all chummy with the chem pushers," Cass said.  


"Keep your voice down!" Brian answered. He dropped his voice. "God, you're worse than Ronnie, blabbing about 'we the Brotherhood' right in the middle of McCarran. Anyway, I didn't say I liked 'em, but they've got a lot of pull here. Want them as friends, not enemies."  


He refused to say anything else until they had all filed into the room (which, being windowless, stank of mold, body odor, and alcohol) and he'd closed the door behind them.  


"Right then," he said briskly. "ED-E, establish EM field, please." The robot beeped in acknowledgement. "Right. We are in this rather unpleasant hotel room because this is the nearest place where I can be reasonably certain House can't listen to us. Why I'm concerned about that...well, you may as well sit down, we may be here a while." When everyone had found a reasonably suitable place on bed or floor - Cass hip-checking Boone aside to claim the chair - Brian continued. "It appears," he said slowly, "that I am, through this extraordinary series of events, in a position to, more or less, singlehandedly decide the fate of the Mojave in general, and Vegas, the dam, and so on. Some of you know some of this, but I don't think any of you - I don't think I've told any of you all of it. So I'll go through it from the beginning." 

He explained his deals with House, and his activation of the Securitrons at the Fort. He told them about his agreement with the Boomers, and what he'd done to make peace in Freeside. And then, hesitantly, he told them about Yes Man: Benny's plan, Emily Ortal's role in it, and the possibility of taking Vegas for himself. This took almost half an hour, including Arcade, Cass, and Veronica's questions, and the three-minute interruption of a guy loudly fucking a Wrangler prostitute in the next room, Cass imitating him, and everyone cracking up. Brian's throat was dry when he finally stopped talking, and he opened a purified water and swallowed some.  


"So..." Arcade began. "I would assume, then...that you call - asked us to come here, because you must decide...well, which side to support?"  


"That, yes, that's correct." Brian stood, pacing to the door, then back again. "I think we're all agreed that the Legion is, as Veronica so eloquently put it, a bunch of hypocritical jerkwads." Cass chuckled and clapped her on the shoulder, and Brian could have sworn he saw Boone smile. "Beyond that, though...one could certainly make a case..." He paced a few steps, then spun around, preparing to begin again.  


"We can and should build an independent Vegas," Arcade injected. "Between Yes Man and this Securitron army, we have the strength - we can wait for the Legion to attack, then make our move. If we're fortunate, we can avoid any more conflict with NCR -"  


"And what if we're not?" Brian retorted. "And...and what about the long term? Can we hold them back forever? One city against a nation?"  


"Not that I'm sayin' this treas - this shit is a good idea, mind ya, but NCR might just defeat itself if it's booted outta the Mojave," Cass put in. "You know what it's like in Shady Sand. Politicians don't know their asses from holes in the ground, 'cept when a brahmin baron pays them to...or the _fucking_ Crimson Caravan does."  


"The New California Republic will not fall," Boone stated evenly.  


Brian hesitated again. "What if you're right, Cass? The NCR falls apart - what replaces it? The Empire of Wellington? That's no better. And if civilization breaks down again, all the progress of the last two hundred years...that is - look. I keep up with the technical stuff back West - y'all know how much I like building and fixing stuff - right. The problem is, resources were badly depleted by the end of America - that was why the War happened. The NCR, both government and private sector, has been able to manufacture some things, mainly with salvaged scrap metal, semi-renewable materials like wood, and crude renewable energy - windmills and such. That's going to run out. And unless we can get practical technology back to that point soon - or, if civilization collapses again...well, there may not be enough left to try again."  


Veronica was nodding, a grim expression on her face. "The scribes don't like talking about that," she said. "But it's real. Lots of things - we've been cannibalizing T-51's for years now, taking two apart and combining them to make one that works. Since there aren't enough of us left these days to fill them all, anyway, it hasn't mattered. But...this can't last."  


" _Rats_ ," Brian said, expanding on the point. "We can't be rats, living off the scraps of the old world; they'll run out. We have to go back to making things ourselves, even if they aren't as good as what we used to have. Being rats is why it's two hundred years after the bombs fell and most of the continent's still grubbing in - I mean, still living with inadequate technology." He frowned. "Of course, that's an argument for House. He says he has a plan: get us up in space again, like he was before the War, and start mining the rest of Sol System. Though I hope he isn't planning to find _fossil_ fuels on lifeless worlds..."  


"What?" Cass asked.  


"One of the displays in the museum at the REPCONN headquarters claims that RobCo will extract _fossil_ fuels from elsewhere in the solar system," Arcade explained. "As the name might suggest, fossils are a prerequisite for _fossil_ fuels, and for fossils, one must have life, to become defunct and hence fossilized. The rest of the solar system is, sadly, deficient in this regard."  


"What about the green men on Mars?" Cass objected. "They're in the fuckin' pre-War books!"  


Arcade released an exasperated sigh. "That would be _fiction_ , Miss Cassidy."  


Cass stuck her tongue out at him. "I knew that."  


"Right, well, returning to the topic at hand..."  


"House may be a genius, but he is not indispensable," Veronica objected. "The lone genius myth is, well, a myth. The only thing you can learn all by yourself in a laboratory is how to masturbate."  


Cass laughed so hard at this that she fell off the chair. Boone swept in faster than a cazador, and was firmly planted in the seat by the time Cass got up.  


"Veronica, as much as I appreciate your sense of humor..." Brian began.  


"Right, sorry, you know I just crack jokes to hide how emotionally damaged and sexually frustrated I am."  


Brian sighed. "You have a valid point about House, though...Though...I mean, I can't say I like the idea of going against House. I can tell he'd never willingly accept the NCR taking over Vegas. He believes that he saved it and he should own it, and honestly...he has a point. If not for him, this whole area would be a ruin like LA, or what Veronica's told me of DC."  


"I believe Boone mentioned saving your life once or twice," Arcade noted. "By that argument, he should own you. Vegas belongs to the people who live in it, not a relic of the Old World. Putting property before people, allowing the wealthy to have their pounds of flesh, was why America destroyed itself."  


"America didn't destroy itself, boss. The _Chinese_ did that. A _Chinese_ bomb burned Cuidad de Mexico and killed...well, I've told you that story, boss."  


"The Chinese would not have bombed Mexico City absent the American occupation of Mexico, which was done to loot the country's remaining resources," Arcade retorted. He turned to Veronica. "Veronica, you know of what I speak. House is just like the Brotherhood, making the same mistakes. Dogs in the manger, the both of them."  


"I don't know about dogs," Veronica answered, "but yes, House is hoarding technology...on the other hand, you kinda sound like a Communist. Sure, maybe someone else out there could get more from Pushy than I do." She stroked the special power fist in question. "But I found it, and it's _mine_ , and anyone who tries to take it is going to get it in the mouth."  


" _Day-um_ , Ronnie," Cass declared.  


"OK, OK." Brian turned, paced, then spun again. "I reckon House has got the right to own the Strip. He bought the 38 before the War, and adverse possession applies to the rest of it. But Arcade is...correct - that doesn't make him absolute ruler of it by right." He considered briefly who should be in charge of Nevada from a purely legal standpoint, with the Enclave both ignoring the Constitution and defunct, but shook his head: it didn't matter now.  


"But then there's the question of the long-term good of humanity," he went on. "Even if House doesn't have the right to rule Vegas, maybe we should let him. Who else can take us into space again, rebuild our technology? The Enclave's gone, the NCR doesn't have the focus, the Legion wants to keep us primitive, and the Followers don't have the resources."  


"Why do ya believe a word outta House's mouth?" Cass asked. "He hides behind those fucking creepy robots - hell, we don't even know for sure it's the same man. Could be some random asshole just set up in the thirty-eight, fifty years ago. Or some super-duper pre-War computer."  


Brian frowned at that. "But -"  


"The NCR is bigger than one man," Boone intoned. He stood, not caring who claimed the chair. "House gives us a single shot. The NCR allows us many."  


" _Us_? Who is 'us'?" Arcade snapped, turning to him. "The people of Vegas?"  


"Boone...Boone has something, there," Brian said. "There's...I remember, one of the pre-War books I found..."  


"The only thing I remember from those is bustin' my ass carryin' them," Cass muttered to Veronica. "Be lucky to get a cap for 'em, but no, we have to 'preserve knowledge of the past'," she imitated Brian, "even if it's a fucking cookbook, with ingredients we don't have now - "  


"Right," Brian declared, snapping his fingers. "The American Civil War, in the 1860s. Abraham Lincoln. He gave a speech on why Southern secession had to be stopped, and there was one point that I remember, about the secession: _the whole principle is one of disintegration, upon which no government can possibly endure_."  


Arcade was about to ask why one needed government at all, but swallowed his words. Despite their disagreements, on balance, he knew the NCR was a good thing for the west, without which the Followers would have a lot more work to do and a lot less resources with which to do it. You needed an organized military, laws and judges so people didn't kill each other over petty disputes, secured roads...the Followers didn't need a chain of command, but that was because they were held together by a common purpose. One couldn't build a nation that way, not without enforcing the purpose on everyone in it...like Caesar did.  


"That's the point," Brian went on, turning to Arcade. "All the towns of the NCR are stronger together than they would be alone. They do not disintegrate. The whole is more than the sum of the parts. _E pluribus unum_."  


"You know that I've heard those words before," Arcade answered. "And America fell. _E pluribus, mortem_."  


"America's ideals were betrayed by the Enclave. That doesn't mean they were bad ones." He spoke with iron force, eyes fixed on Arcade's. "Just because the Old World burned doesn't mean the NCR is going to die. We've got to get up, and try, try, try." Then he relaxed. "And three hundred years is pretty good, as civilizations go."  


"The NCR does not care about the people of Vegas!" Arcade insisted. "The sole purpose of its presence here is to secure power - both electrical, and political - and water."  


"Well, Mister Lab Coat, folks back West are needin' clean water. There's more water in the Colorado than Mojave'll ever need. Why not bring it where it's needed?"  


" _It is not from the benevolence of the butcher, the brewer, and the baker that we have our dinner_ ," Brian quoted. "What helps NCR helps the people here too. Until they showed up, there weren't any working water pipelines from Lake Mead, the Dam was a worthless hunk of cement, and...well, that's good enough to start with."  


"I'm worried about the NCR's leadership," Veronica said after a long silence. "They threw away a lot of soldiers' lives to take Helios from us. And all I heard at the one-eight-eight seemed to be complaints of NCR incompetence: supply shortages, corruption, units moved back and forth to no purpose..."  


"Well, everyone likes playing armchair general, even when they've no idea what's going on," Brian retorted. "But, you're right. The problem is...well, political. The Mojave might be able to stand up for its own interests, once it's a voting province in NCR. But good leadership..."  


"The NCR may lack that, but we do not," Arcade tried. "All the failures of the NCR, you could avoid them. You could manage policy exactly as you wish, as leader of an independent Vegas."  


"Dictator, you mean. For an anti-authoritarian, you seem a little eager to exchange one master for another. And even a benevolent dictator must die one day, unless House's claims are true, and since his approach seems to involve staying sealed inside the 38 forever, it's not that appealing. It's life without the living."  


Arcade sighed. "Those who most want power are least fit to have it. And _vice versatum_."  


"Well, if..." Brian froze in mid-step, an idea having struck him. He stared at the ceiling. Seconds passed as his lips moved rapidly and silently. Finally, he spoke, slowly. "Ah, Ro - that is, Cass...do you know when the next, election is?"  


"March, not sure when. I know they're nominatin' candidates come January. Why d'ya ask?"  


"Immaterial. Right! Thank you, everyone, you've all been extraordinarily helpful. I have a plan, now. Well, two plans, A and B if you will. Good to have a fallback strategy. Especially when A's so far-fetched. OK! Let's head back to the 38, folks." He was out the door before anyone could say anything.  


"Did he always do this?" Arcade asked Boone, who'd traveled with him the longest.  


"Yes," Boone answered. "And, oddly, his plans usually work."  


Arcade sighed, and followed them. "Well, for the sake of everyone in Vegas, I hope this one does."


End file.
